Clearly and undeniably great, and yet a bit troubling. I mean, how am I to take this song? Is everything between the intro and the final verse playful self-examination and self-criticism on the part of the narrator, who's acknowledging his own failings as just another dense, reactionary "redneck"? Or is he defiantly celebrating the ignorance and prejudice he knows others think are endemic to his kind? Or is he sarcastically sketching what he knows other people (perhaps incorrectly?) think he's like, so he can really twist the knife in that final verse, with its completely deserved broadside against Northern hypocrisy? Is it some combination of these things? And what does Newman expect us to take away from all this if we can't even be sure where the narrator stands?